Emmanuelle Beart

Emmanuelle Béhart-Hasson was born in St. Tropez, on the French Riviera. She is the daughter of the Lebanese-Egyptian, French based singer and songwriter Guy Béart who is of Jewish descent, and the Italian-Greek actress Geneviève Galéa. In a recent trip to Croatia, she revealed that one of her grandmothers was Croatian.

She obtained an acting role in the 1976 film Tomorrow's Children. In her teens she appeared in bit parts in television then went to Montreal, Canada to work as a nanny before returning to France the following year to attend drama school in Paris. A short time later she was cast in her first adult role in a film, and in 1986 she achieved fame with her role opposite Yves Montand, in the film Manon of the Spring. For her performance, she won the 1987 César Award for "Best Supporting Actress". She also won a "Best Actress" award at the Moscow International Film Festival for her starring role in the 1995 film, A French Woman. After a ten-year relationship with Daniel Auteuil (her co-star in Manon of the Spring and A Heart in Winter), she divorced him and re-married.

In addition to her award for Best Supporting Actress, she has also been nominated for a César Award for her roles in the following years:
- 1985 — A Strange Passion
- 1986 — Love on the Quiet
- 1990 — Children of Chaos
- 1992 — The Beautiful Troublemaker
- 1993 — A Heart in Winter
- 1996 — Nelly and Mr. Arnaud

In addition to her screen work, Béart is also known for her social activism. She is an ambassador for UNICEF, and has made news for her opposition to France's anti-immigration legislation. In 1996, she made headlines when, defending the rights of the "sans-papiers" (illegal immigrants), she was forcibly removed after her group’s occupation of a Paris church.

Apparently she will also be moonlighting this Christmas (2006) as a lingerie model, having been retained for H&M for their annual campaign.